The Case of the Imaginary Detective

by Karen Joy Fowler

Rima Lanisell is at a loose end, following the death of her father. She has come to California to stay with her godmother, Addison Early, who once knew Rima's father well. Addison is a best-selling mystery writer. Over the years, she has tried to protect her work and her privacy as her fans have become ever more intrusive.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Contemporary, Crime, The United States Of America

324 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2008

About the author

Karen Joy Fowler is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels and three short story collections. Her 2004 novel, The Jane Austen Book Club, spent thirteen weeks on the New York Times bestsellers list and was a New York Times Notable Book. Fowler’s previous novel, Sister Noon, was a finalist for the 2001 PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction. Her debut novel, Sarah Canary, won the Commonwealth medal for best first novel by a Californian, was listed for the Irish Times International Fiction Prize as well as the Bay Area Book Reviewers Prize, and was a New York Times Notable Book. Fowler’s short story collection Black Glass won the World Fantasy Award in 1999, and her collection What I Didn’t See won the World Fantasy Award in 2011. Her most recent novel We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, won the 2014 PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction and was short-listed for the 2014 Man Booker Prize. Her new novel Booth published in March 2022.

She is the co-founder of the Otherwise Award and the current president of the Clarion Foundation (also known as Clarion San Diego). Fowler and her husband, who have two grown children and seven grandchildren, live in Santa Cruz, California. Fowler also supports a chimp named Caesar who lives at the Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Sierra Leone.

Reviews

[SeaBae · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book in the UK; I prefer the US title, "Wit's End," as it is a more accurate indication of the book's themes and content.

The UK jacket copy made the book sound like a lighthearted romp with a fictional detective come to life to help the heroine.

Instead, the book is a rumination on grief, the creative process, and just who "owns" a creative work once it is accessible by the public. Does it belong to the author? To the fan? To the real life people & events on whom the fictional characters and situations are modeled?

A slight, slightly discombobulated novel, but I loved the themes and the questions they raised.

[Ahtims · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had listened to the audiobook , "Wits end" ( the UK title ) in 2013 and had given it 4 stars.
This is supposedly the US title
Bought the used paperback at a book fair and delved immediately into it as I remembered liking the audio. This time around I was bored by the time I reached halfway through. Somehow completed this confusing novel.

[Jacquie South · Rating 2 out of 5]

2 ⭐️ is generous for this book.
I forced myself to finish reading it, thinking that SURELY something was going to happen. Something was going to make it worthwhile. Unfortunately nothing did happen and it wasn’t worthwhile. The ‘big reveal’ at the end was definitely not worth the rest of the book and was a whimper rather than a bang.
Characters uninteresting and rather unlikeable.
Just a book full of nothing. Don’t waste your time.

[Tricia · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was only short but it took me ages. I really had to force myself to finish. I felt very confused for most of this book. I didn’t really understand the story.

This book wasn’t for me

[Kiri Lucas · Rating 4 out of 5]

After Rima Lanisell's father dies, she goes to stay with her godmother, Addison Early. Addison is a hugely successful crime fiction writer and was a close friend of Rima's father. However, she is very private and Rima struggles to understand the history of Addison and her father while she figures out her place and purpose in the world.

Fowler's books are fun and the characters are quirky. This was an easy and engaging read.

[Carla · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just love Karen Joy Fowler's writing so, so much.

[Girl · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Very funny, very engrossing, very meta. Maybe a little bit underdeveloped? Or maybe I will have to re-read to get it all.

[Nicola Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lovely little fun read

[Maura Heaphy Dutton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, I am sure swimming against the tide of opinion on this one, but I LOVED this clever, thoughtful. touching and brilliantly written book.

I should say that, some, if not all, of its problems for haters may be that it has been appallingly handled by its publishers, who clearly had no idea how to make it work in the "let's bash this square peg into a round hold" playbook that passes for book marketing these days. Cover art that misrepresents and trivializes the book and its themes? Check! A title for the UK edition that misrepresents, trivializes AND over-emphasizes one minor part of the whole? Check! Cover blurbs that are about a completely different Karen Joy Fowler book? Well, of course. Why not? Authors write the same book, every time, don't they? There you go, that should ensure that at least 50% of the readers who pick this up are getting something completely different than they were led to expect. You can thank me later ...

In my case, the "something different" was pure, unadulterated delight. Half-expecting a lightly novelized Cluedo scenario, or an upmarket Nancy Drew for adults, I only picked up this book because I was curious about Karen Joy Fowler, who I have heroically avoided reading (except for some of her short fiction) for far too long, and my favorite charity book shop was having a "BOGO" deal. How lucky I am that I can't resist a bargain ...

Why do I love this book? It is beautifully written. Fowler demonstrates an effortless mastery of every aspect of the craft, from word and sentence level, right through to the Big Ticket items, the pacing and structure of the narrative. Characters are sketched in surely and sympathetically. I feel I have known these people, all my life, whether we're talking about major characters like poor lost "adult orphan" Rima, or slightly scary Addison Early (a clever blend of authors who inspire cult-ish fan followings, like Agatha Christie and J.K. Rowling), or the walk-on parts, up to and including the two dachshunds, Berkeley and Stanford. (I will never look at dachshunds in the same way again. I may have to give this book to two friends who are great dachshund lovers ...) The quasi-omniscient narrative voice is pitch-perfect, and sometimes laugh out loud funny.

I love this book because it works on two levels. The first is the meta-level: this is a book about writing, and authorship. Everyone in this book is writing something, whether it's novels, blogs, fanfic, newspaper columns, Wikipeida entries, websites, college term papers, ransom letters or old fashioned snail mail. I don't think I have ever seen it presented so clearly, and so well, that, in these crazy times we live in, everyone is an author. Everyone in the book thinks that he or she has control of the narrative (just ponder that on the meta-level for a second ...), and is the hero of his/her own story. But if everyone is an author, and we can all, literally, "write our own adventure," where does that leave old-fashioned storytelling, and the old-fashioned story tellers like A.B Early, K.J. Fowler, Agatha Christie and J.K. Rowling?

But it also works on the level of character, the personal level. The deaths, one by one, of her mother, brother and father leave Rima, at the tender age of 29, an "orphan," struggling to find herself (or re-invent herself -- again, another sort of authorship), and those struggles feel very real and true, and beautifully rendered, to me. But perhaps I should confess that nine years ago, when I was a bit older than 29, I found myself in Rima's position, when my only, younger brother suddenly and unexpectedly passed away. Suddenly, no Mom (since 1996), no Dad (since 2003) ... and no one to phone me on our long-deceased grandmother's birthday (just to rub it in that he remembered, and I never did). No one to remember squeezing ourselves into the tiny "way back" of our Dad's VW, and the time the heat got stuck on HI, and we almost died of heatstroke. No one to reassure me that the beagle who chewed up all our Mom's shoes was really found a wonderful new home, on a farm upstate, no matter what anyone else says ...

So, yeah, it worked on the personal level for me. You can only find out if it works for you, if you try it ...

[Anita · Rating 4 out of 5]

The original title for this book is Wit's End, which is more appropriate for the characters and where they find themselves in life. The prose is sparkling and witty with enough twists and turns to keep the reader interested. I suspect this book is written more in the style of the Jane Austen Book Club as it's not as dark as We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. I found the concept of the "murder scene dollhouses" as representations of the mystery writer's books wonderfully novel and funny. This isn't a book of high drama, but the characters are real and relatable and I really enjoyed it.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Witty and fun.

[Tasha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just finished the book
Giving it a 3 star ratting.
It gained points for having a compelling story and being beautiful written in away that I felt like I knew these characters they felt like real people but it lost points for the overall mystery plot being quite confusing up to the point where the end didn't make alot of sense.
I mean a few of the cases that had me confused definitely were tide up nicely at the end and some of them even had me shocked not going to lie in a way of "OH my god... That makes total sense"but there were things that I was still unsure about and made me feel like I didn't read the book fully like I skipped a few chapters but that's just became the story telling is all over the place not very well structured.

[Jill · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am not sure that I need to write a review for Karen Joy Fowler's 'The Imaginary Detective' as so many other reviewers have echoed my thoughts. This attempt at meta-fiction was a jumble of plots that went nowhere concerning a reclusive author and her wayward goddaughter, a mish-mash of events in the present then the past concerning the characters in her books and real life people, cardboard characters I could not raise an ounce of sympathy for, some kind of mystery to solve that I never came to grips with, letters from a fan to the fictional detective as if he was a real person, amateurish snippets from the author's best-selling books and, oh, I could go on. How did this pass an editor and a publisher, not to mention the hideous cover design? I skimmed a lot thinking if I read quickly it would make more sense.

[Annabel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I always like a Karen Joy Fowler book, she’s one of my favourite authors. This one was about family and belonging and also was kind of meta with stories within stories within stories. The question is what is more real, the story version or the real version.
We have a lady, late 20s, who is coming to live with her godmother, who she doesn’t really know. This young lady has lost her entire family, father, mother and now younger brother. She is struggling with this grief. Her godmother is a famous detective novelist, with a character that was the young lady’s father. Who was a murderer in one of the books. The mystery is who was the father, was he the character in the book, what happened with the godmother and the mother, who is the stalker, there is a mysterious cult. It’s all stories within stories. And people treating fictional characters as real.

[Micaela · Rating 5 out of 5]

I must say I like Fowler. I liked the main character, following imaginary (?) mistery threads, but trying to build new relationships and rebuild a new life after terrible events , drifting in and out of dreams and memories. I liked the book in the book idea and the complex relationship between real and fictional characters. Some characters are very complex: who you are, the personality you show as a writer, the way you want to be remembered you were, you in someone’s memories, the fictional character named after you in a book, the virtual you in the web. And sometimes fictional characters seem more real than real ones. I enjoyed reading this book , sad but healing in a strange slow way. My favorite character is Oliver.

[Cliff · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have totally lost patience with this book after getting three-quarters of the way through. I felt, as one who lost his mother at age 26 and his father 9 years later but continued working as I had always done, that the character of Rima was just a total wimp who needed a good slapping. Otherwise I had no sense of her character. In fact, characterisation is nearly non existent. As one who reads a lot of detective stories, my feeling was one of surprise that that which underlies the book had done so well. The excerpts, such as they were, just did not ring true Life is too short to try and finish such as this.

[aeniez · Rating 3 out of 5]

the book started slow and i got to admit, i left this book years ago because i could not understand the real story. but, last week, i pick it up n started to read it again from beginning. it was different from other books i read, how a person deal with death in her life, how she fall in love with a fictional character, how she tried to dig up the past n solve mystery, it was nice. though it started slow, it became intrigue n interesting from one chapter to another. i kinda disapointed with the ending though, i dont know, i want more. that's it. :)

[Standback]

Definitely enjoyed; Fowler is a delight.

Agree with the consensus - this is a much weaker work than Fowler's other books; it never quite finds its hook or its stride.

I'm seeing a lot of intriguing parallels with her later We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, including toying with memory, and the intense connection between the sensible sister and her absent, impulsive brother.

[Sandy Sexton · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book didn't grab me, and I look forward to seeing what other readers thought of it. Rima Lanisell's father dies, so while coping with her grief she goes to live with her Godmother in Santa Cruz in a house called Wits End - the original title of this novel.

There's suppose to be a bit of a mystery over who stole the miniature corpse from the doll houe, who was the obsessive fan cat lady - but my curiosity about these matters wasn't engaged and it all seemed a bit aimless. Maybe it was just me...

[Emma Jackson · Rating 2 out of 5]

The blurb on the back of the book promises a mystery and I spent most of the book anticipating the time we'd get to it. I feel like it took too long to get good. I'd usually give up on a book this slow but I kept reading hoping for something to bring meaning to everything I'd read already. The mystery arrived and it was well thought out, explaining most of what had happened just woefully late and followed by the most abrupt ending in any book I've ever read.

[Karschtl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn't like the book very much. The story and the entanglement with the literary figures and people from the past was very strange and kid of weird and somehow I didn't really get WHAT the mystery was in the first place that Rima was trying to solve. And thus I wasn't really interested in following it. But I did read til the end.

[Erika · Rating 3 out of 5]

I went into this thinking it would be more of a mystery, so I was kind of disappointed that that part of the book seemed only secondary to Rima's "emotional healing process". There were bits I liked and bits that seemed unnecessary or silly, but overall it was nice enough so I wanted to finish it. To anyone looking to read a detective story, I'd recommend something else, though.

[Richa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the writing of Karen Joy Fowler. Simply beautiful. The sentences so intimately carved. I have no idea why the book is not more popular but I think this is one the best books that I have read so far. It confuses you initially but that is the charm of it all. Slowly and gradually you are able to understand each character for who or what they are.

[Ann Tonks · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had this book sitting on my shelf for ages - and I must have intuitively known it wasn't for me. I tried to read it....got as far as 50 pages in....but that was enough. The writing feels rather "arch"; self-knowing. And I didn't care about the lead character and had no idea, that far in, what her intentions or desires were. So I stopped.

[Jennifer Fernandez · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have re-read this book twice and both times found new things that I did not notice before. Fowler is great at making the narrative flow while dropping in bits of information that makes you want to know more. The story is engaging but it is more than the story, the depth of this work makes you want to revisit it a few times because it tweaks your interest.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

A woman grieving the death of her father goes to stay with her godmother who is a famous mystery writer. I didn’t enjoy this much. The mix of real and fictional characters, many of which had the same name, was confusing. The story lacked a central plot, didn’t seem to go anywhere, and left me feeling unsatisfied.

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

From the author of The Jane Austen Book Club is a totally different book. I liked it, enjoyed the setting in the Santa Cruz area and some of the humor but it just seemed to drag on a little bit even though I have to say it was very well written and very unuual. Worth checking out of the library.

[Martine Peacock · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went through this book thinking I wasn't quite getting it, that I was a step behind. An odd bunch of characters. The relationship between Addison and Rima was never quite filled in, and this made the whole story seem a bit unreal. Worth reading, but not a five-starrer.

[Tineke · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, this was boring. The book went nowhere in my opinion. Nothing really resolved. The only thing that sort of saves this book was the fact that the writing didn´t actually annoy me. But other than that: yawn.

[Gina · Rating 1 out of 5]

Quite possibly one of the worst books I've read! I endured it right to the end in the hope that it would actually get better which it did not! Characters are two-dimensional and there's really no plot to speak of. Very disappointing